Many here will be interested in the recently published report from the
U.S., Diane M. Zorich, A Survey of Digital Cultural Heritage Initiatives
and their Sustainability Concerns (Council on Library and Information
Resources, June 2003), available at
http://www.clir.org/pubs/reports/pub118/contents.html. The following is
from the Preface:

>Nearly every organization whose mission includes promoting access to
>information is well aware of the value of digital collections. To cultural
>organizations and funders alike, the prospect of making collections
>available to new and distant audiences is compelling. Digital technology
>is finding its way into cultural organizations, and it offers great
>promise for enhancing access. However, digitization efforts, despite
>everyone's good intentions, rise and fall on the waves of external funding.
>
>New organizations have been created to promote and manage a growing number
>of digital initiatives. Some traditional organizations have added projects
>to accommodate the digital agenda, but they often treat these projects as
>special initiatives, rather than long-term programs that will require an
>ongoing commitment of funding, staffing, and time. The economic downturn
>has increased the vulnerability of many digital programs, especially those
>run by very small organizations that lack the human or financial resource
>cushion to sustain "add-on" programs.

and this from the Summary:

>The findings outlined throughout this report identify concerns about the
>current status and tenuous state of many digital cultural initiatives.
>These findings, in concert with the recommendations proposed, offer a
>blueprint for those exploring appropriate strategies to support and
>strengthen digital cultural initiatives. The number and diversity of
>issues that affect DCHIs and jeopardize their future warrant a coordinated
>and consensus-driven approach to the problem.

It would seem that "short-term" and "short-sighted" are in this context
uncomfortably synonymous. Indeed, in this context the irony of how the term
"initiative" is used becomes obvious: "That which initiates, begins, or
originates; the first step in some process or enterprise; hence the act, or
action, of initiating or taking the first step or lead; beginning,
commencement, origination" (OED). And this leads to a story.

Once, a fair time ago, when one did this sort of thing as a matter of
course and without any peril, I picked up a hitchhiker, and while driving
asked him and got asked the usual sorts of questions. He said, explaining
what he did, "I start communes." He then described a few he'd started
before moving on to new initiatives. It wasn't until some time
later, after I had dropped him off, that I realized I hadn't asked him why
he didn't stick around to see what happened. I wondered. It wasn't until
some months later, when I visited the commune Morning Star, then deep into
the latter stages of its decay, that I realized why a commune initiator
could find it easy to move on. When brownie-points are given for starting
new things, what are the rewards for seeing to their long-term sustainability?